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Sep. 26th, 2012 09:38 amWeird day yesterday. I slept a LOT, like at least ten hours, maybe more. Then I ate leftover pasta and brownies that Vincent and I had made the night before while still lying in bed watching shows online. Because I'm not sure what else to do with my life right now. There was cream cheese in the fridge so I ate a bunch of that too. (By the way, my ability to stuff my face is still down from the two or three weeks I spent eating scraps of leftovers, so when I say "a bunch" consider that it wasn't really a lot, but felt like a lot to me.)
Anyway then I went back to lying down watching shows and without realizing it fell asleep. The window was open and it was really cold out, but I was enjoying that after the hot summer we'd suffered here in France. I woke up just before Vincent and I were scheduled to go back over to my most recent wonderful host family and have dinner. I felt kinda weird having just woken up, but I was excited for the dinner and all that stuff so yay. I felt kinda lightheaded/groggy, but I figured it was because of all the unnecessary sleep I'd gotten.
Well we were about two streets away when suddenly I got really dizzy. I told Vincent to wait and went to lean on a nearby storefront for support. I felt the dizziness totally take over and the next thing I knew, I realized I was dreaming or something and felt pavement against my hip and hand and heard a lady's voice asking from a long way away if I needed a doctor. I mumbled I was fine and then I was on my feet again somehow, wondering what the hell was going on, and staggered a few feet away to sit on the curb while my hearing slowly came back. I remember mumbling "Whoa I think I might have fainted!" to Vincent, who said "Yeah, you were unconscious for about two minutes."
I felt really nauseated and my stomach was burning so I wondered if I was going to be sick, but I still tried to get to the dinner date. We crossed the street, Vincent hovering awkwardly nearby, and I realized I needed to sit again and I wasn't going to make it. We went back to the apartment, only about two blocks away, but I needed to stop and rest at least six times and really doubted my ability to make it. I just wanted to lie down.
The worst is that I'd noticed that taking deep breaths kind of made my lungs burn a little bit for about a day, but ever since I fainted I've had something that's not quite heartburn, more like a dull throbbing pain in my chest. I was secretly terrified it was a heart attack for a while, but it's nowhere near that severe. I talked about it on facebook and a friend who's a nurse told me it sounded like my blood pressure was really low and my heart was having trouble getting enough oxygen. I've been taking deep breaths and the pain has decreased but even now, the next morning, it's there. It wasn't there when I first woke up, but by staying awake I've made it come back.
So yeah, color me freaked out. I've never fainted before in my life so I honestly thought it was cool and was rather disappointed that I only had Vincent to tell me what had happened, because he thinks of himself as a writer but he sure as hell isn't a storyteller and I had to ask him fifty times for various details before I got a vague idea of what he saw. Apparently I was about to lean on the building when suddenly I just dropped--the other way, so it wasn't even a graceful slide down the side of the store window or whatever--and Vincent's reaction was to try to drag me back to my feet. He said I said something about being fine (crazy because I was absolutely unconscious then with no memory of this but I wouldn't be surprised since "I'M FINE" is my immediate reaction to everything that goes wrong) but as soon as he got me up I collapsed again, so he said he was holding me on my knees for a while and that was when a passerby asked if she needed to call a doctor. At that point I was coming to and quickly responded in English about how fine I was.
Super weird! I'm planning to be on my feet a little more today, but unsure if I want to risk leaving the building in case something happens again. I'm thinking I'll start doing a TLC-level cleaning job on Vincent's place, one pile of mysterious items at a time, which will at least keep me walking around this little room. I might try taking some of his empty wine bottles down to the recycle bin in the courtyard if I feel up to it.
Anyway then I went back to lying down watching shows and without realizing it fell asleep. The window was open and it was really cold out, but I was enjoying that after the hot summer we'd suffered here in France. I woke up just before Vincent and I were scheduled to go back over to my most recent wonderful host family and have dinner. I felt kinda weird having just woken up, but I was excited for the dinner and all that stuff so yay. I felt kinda lightheaded/groggy, but I figured it was because of all the unnecessary sleep I'd gotten.
Well we were about two streets away when suddenly I got really dizzy. I told Vincent to wait and went to lean on a nearby storefront for support. I felt the dizziness totally take over and the next thing I knew, I realized I was dreaming or something and felt pavement against my hip and hand and heard a lady's voice asking from a long way away if I needed a doctor. I mumbled I was fine and then I was on my feet again somehow, wondering what the hell was going on, and staggered a few feet away to sit on the curb while my hearing slowly came back. I remember mumbling "Whoa I think I might have fainted!" to Vincent, who said "Yeah, you were unconscious for about two minutes."
I felt really nauseated and my stomach was burning so I wondered if I was going to be sick, but I still tried to get to the dinner date. We crossed the street, Vincent hovering awkwardly nearby, and I realized I needed to sit again and I wasn't going to make it. We went back to the apartment, only about two blocks away, but I needed to stop and rest at least six times and really doubted my ability to make it. I just wanted to lie down.
The worst is that I'd noticed that taking deep breaths kind of made my lungs burn a little bit for about a day, but ever since I fainted I've had something that's not quite heartburn, more like a dull throbbing pain in my chest. I was secretly terrified it was a heart attack for a while, but it's nowhere near that severe. I talked about it on facebook and a friend who's a nurse told me it sounded like my blood pressure was really low and my heart was having trouble getting enough oxygen. I've been taking deep breaths and the pain has decreased but even now, the next morning, it's there. It wasn't there when I first woke up, but by staying awake I've made it come back.
So yeah, color me freaked out. I've never fainted before in my life so I honestly thought it was cool and was rather disappointed that I only had Vincent to tell me what had happened, because he thinks of himself as a writer but he sure as hell isn't a storyteller and I had to ask him fifty times for various details before I got a vague idea of what he saw. Apparently I was about to lean on the building when suddenly I just dropped--the other way, so it wasn't even a graceful slide down the side of the store window or whatever--and Vincent's reaction was to try to drag me back to my feet. He said I said something about being fine (crazy because I was absolutely unconscious then with no memory of this but I wouldn't be surprised since "I'M FINE" is my immediate reaction to everything that goes wrong) but as soon as he got me up I collapsed again, so he said he was holding me on my knees for a while and that was when a passerby asked if she needed to call a doctor. At that point I was coming to and quickly responded in English about how fine I was.
Super weird! I'm planning to be on my feet a little more today, but unsure if I want to risk leaving the building in case something happens again. I'm thinking I'll start doing a TLC-level cleaning job on Vincent's place, one pile of mysterious items at a time, which will at least keep me walking around this little room. I might try taking some of his empty wine bottles down to the recycle bin in the courtyard if I feel up to it.
